Items tagged with scan
Your friendly neighborhood Walmart may be getting even closer to "getting with the times." And in fact, surging beyond them. To date, few stores have really, truly embraced mobile payments. And perhaps even fewer have even considered smartphone integration with the buying process. But the mega-retailer Walmart is reportedly testing a new system that could enable shoppers to scan items as they browse using an iPhone, and then pay at a self-checkout counter based on what they've scanned in the store. It's a shifting of the process; today, the self-checkout lane makes you scan everything as you exit, but it'd go much faster if you scanned as you shopped. The idea is obviously being considered in...
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Many techs will agree: antivirus programs can be a hassle. Mostly, the issues tend to stem from slower performance and similar issues that result from using an antivirus program. Still, it’s a bit of a lesser of two evils deal: you can risk getting a virus, or you can deal with lags in performance. Usually, you can count on well-known antivirus programs to only touch malicious files, but this isn’t always the case.AVG, a free antivirus scanner, recently created problems for some of its users when it mistook user32.dll, a critical Windows component, for a container for the Trojan Horses PSW.Banker4.APSA or Generic9TBN. When the scanner activated, it assumed this critical file was a virus and deleted...
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Obviously all the extra searches and scans at airports which have followed 9/11 mean that getting through an airport has become a marathon process. One such part of an airport visit may be reduced in duration, thanks to technology.It all began with Richard Reid. Reid was arrested on December 22, 2001 for attempting to destroy a Boeing 767 on American Airlines Flight 63, a flight from Paris, Charles De Gaulle International Airport to Miami International Airport, USA, by igniting explosives hidden in his shoes. And since then, examining shoes has become a constant at not just airports, but at some courthouses and other secure facilities.Israel has introduced a step-on scanner...
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I remember the good old days when banks would offer new customers gifts like toasters or other housewares when you opened up an account. Of course, the good old days weren't really very good, because you had to stand in line at the bank fairly often instead of using direct deposit, internet banking, credit and debit cards, and ATMs to manage your finances remotely. The final reason to visit a bank regularly might become a thing of the past, as CheckFree Corp. is equipping banks with the tech they need to allow customers to scan checks slated for deposit, then deposit them electronically.Called Remote Deposit Capture, the technology lets people scan checks through their home computers and deposit...
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Panasonic System Solutions Company has created the so called “Walkthrough Iris Identification System,” which is a device that can scan a person’s iris while he/she walks through. As we may have already seen in the movies, iris identification is a highly advanced type of biometric authentication technology that does not use ID cards or passwords, which users could lose or forget. A drawback to biometric authentication technologies is that they are not always accurate. Nevertheless, at a verification failure rate of less than 1/1,200,000, the Walkthrough Iris Identification System is quite formidable. “To enable verification of a person walking (at 1 m per second) from a distance of more than...
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Princeton has agreed to let Google digitize about 1 million public domain books which are no longer in copyright, into the enormous database that is Google Books. The project started two years ago, and aims to digitize many of the worlds books, allowing them to be searchable over the web. "The Web search leader said on Monday Princeton had agreed to work with it to digitize about 1 million public domain books -- works no longer covered by copyright protections. The combined collections of the university's libraries total more than 6 million printed works, 5 million manuscripts and 2 million nonprint items. A Google spokeswoman said her...
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NVIDIA has yet to respond to the lawsuit filed by Scanner Technologies, in which they claim NVIDIA sold products based on a 3D BGA inspection system, used to ensure product reliability. Along with seeking undisclosed damages, Scanner Technologies is also going after preliminary and permanent injunctions, as well legal fees and court fees. "The complaint alleges that nVidia has sold and/or is presently selling throughout the United States infringing BGA devices that are covered by one or more claims of the Scanner Patents. The complaint also alleges that nVidia has induced others to infringe. These BGA devices are a component in graphics cards,...
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Last Tuesday it was reported that Hewlett-Packard was having an ongoing internal investigation over who was leaking information to the press, and the source was assumed to be one of the company's directors. CNet news is now reporting that HP may have illegally accessed the phone records of the companies directors, as well as a few journalists, and possibly others. With the current turmoil going on, HP Chairman Patricia Dunn has announced her resignation from the post, with current CEO and President Mark Hurde to take over. "Dunn's departure caps a tumultuous episode for HP, one of the country's largest companies and a Silicon Valley...
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For a time, AOL was intent on creating a huge database containing what types of things people usually search for. When the operation was revealed, AOL apologized, removed the file, but not in time. 21 Million search queries is what the file contains, and with a number like that, you know you're going to see a great variety in what people like to search for. Love, revenge, material things, all of the usual stuff is there, mixed with some other things you may or may not expect. "That database does not include names or user identities. Instead, it lists only a unique ID number for each user. What that means is that it's possible to view the...
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